East Lansing’s total budget for the upcoming fiscal year is expected to be about $9.5 million less than the current fiscal year as the city tightens its belt and looks for ways to cut costs.
Top city leaders got their first look at the city’s preliminary budget for the 2012-13 fiscal year during a work session prior to the city council’s regular work session Tuesday night at City Hall, 410 Abbot Road.
Additional work sessions are scheduled in the coming weeks to discuss the budget, with voting for approval by the council scheduled for May 15.
Preliminary documents call for funding cuts to the city’s hazardous sidewalk repair program, but also include a one-mill increase in funding for the East Lansing Public Library.
Projections for next year put the city’s total budget at about $64.5 million, a 12.86 percent decrease from the current fiscal year.
This past year’s total budget was about $74 million.
The city’s general fund budget for the 2012-13 fiscal year is set at about $31.04 million, according to estimates.
Among budget changes, the city’s public safety expenditures are expected to decrease because of the planned consolidation of the city’s 911 dispatch services to a central Ingham County center. About 13 positions are scheduled to be transferred to the consolidated dispatch center, cutting costs for the East Lansing Police Department.
Initial discussions of the budget in February showed the city needed to address a nearly $1 million budget shortfall between revenues and expenditures for the upcoming fiscal year.
The process of delivering a workable budget estimate was exhaustive, but is by no means finished, Finance Director Mary Haskell said.
“We’ve been working with these numbers really, before December (2011),” she said at the meeting.
City Manager George Lahanas called the preliminary budget “responsible.”
“While there certainly is a commitment to our core services, there’s more work to do,” he said.
The potential for reduced public services and public safety has raised concern among council members in the past few weeks, leading the council to authorize Lahanas to include a one-mill levy to support the library in the preliminary budget.
At an earlier meeting, the council also authorized Lahanas and the city attorney to draft a resolution to place an additional millage on this November’s ballot.
The one-mill levy would help create a dedicated source of funding for the library, a stream of revenue City Manager George Lahanas called “modest.”
Councilmember Don Power said city officials must continue to shape the budget in the coming weeks, but added the preliminary document is a good start.
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